Thing #23 It was fun and I made it.

I will use the questions of the Library 2 Play site to share my feelings about this enjoyable program.

What were your favorite discoveries or exercises on this learning journey?

I liked learning how to create video presentations even though they were my biggest challenge. I also enjoyed discovering a number of different search engines. Library Thing is a great way for me to catalog my books and find people with shared interests in my reading.

How has this program assisted or affected your lifelong learning goals?

I am always excited when I can learn to use new forms of technology I may have not been familiar with or did not even know they existed. I will use these programs to open students eyes to the importance of learning technology and for keeping the curriculum fresh and interesting for my students.

Were there any take-a-ways or unexpected outcomes from this program that surprised you?

I was surprised about how many different types of search engines and blog programs existed. I also feel I can transition from using my Mac at home with my PC at work without losing the ability to put together complete and fulfilling projects.

What could we do differently to improve upon this program’s format or concept?

I think this program is great but might be a little overwhelming for those less comfortable with technology. I am able to learn by toying around with programs which is encouraged by 23 things (ex. the sandbox). I think more step by step instructions might be useful to technologically hesitant individuals.

If we offered another discovery program like this in the future, would you choose to participate?

I would definitely participate if time allowed it. I really enjoyed this program and I always want to learn more but it was time consuming and I would need a window of time to complete it. I liked that the program game us time to work on it at our own pace. I have two small children and sometimes I needed to work on this late at night when they were asleep.

How would you describe your learning experience in ONE WORD or in ONE SENTENCE, so we could use your words to promote 23 Things learning activities.

The pressure of just one word. I would say - stimulating.

Thank you very much for this opportunity. I will be using this blog to connect with my students and their families as I see this as a place families can go to share their experiences about our classroom journey.

Thing #22

Teacher Lingo is an interesting site and provides more useful tools for elementary school teachers than educator ning. It has a search engine for lesson plans that lets you specify by subject, grade or specific term. I entered third grade and found a number of useful ideas in different plans. It also allows you to view elementary school teacher blogs for more helpful ideas/advice. I will definitely use this ning to supplement my plans and to find new ideas. It also has a message board if you want to ask the educational community a question.

Thing #21

It was great to learn about audacity and photostory. I had practiced using photostory during the summer PBL program. The students really enjoyed putting together projects as did I. My first challenge was getting my photographs transferred from my Mac computer over to my PC. E-mailing them took too much space. So I used one of our other technology sources, Flickr CC, and downloaded my photographs. I then logged on to photostory and imported those photographs. I put them in order, added writing to each picture, voiced audio through my microphone and finalized the presentation. The volume can be heard through earphones on my PC but I would need external speakers to hear the presentation without them.

My biggest challenge which took quite some time was to transfer the photostory to my blog. I followed the steps listed on 23 things and for several attempts, the video would not link. Finally, after making sure I saved it as a wmv file and slowly taking each step, it worked. I liked the final product but that frustration level was the highest of all the 23 things technology I have used. I am glad it was during the summer while I was not in school so I could figure out the problem. The blog help link was not much help at all giving very generic and limited advice. The comments from the 23 things users were much more helpful.

Mrs. Burk Perimeter Rap

Mrs. Burk Perimeter Rap

Shared via AddThis

Thing #20

At the You Tube website, I did a search under the topic "third grade classroom management" and found several videos with great advice on how to organize my classroom and establish good classroom management.

At the Teacher Tube website, I did a search under 3rd grade math. I found a hilarious video rap song about perimeter and area by Mrs. Burk. I have embedded the video in a separate post.

I think Teacher Tube is a great way to get ideas when you have tried to present material in different ways but some students still do not comprehend it. A second or third opinion is always nice to have and these websites allow teachers videos with ideas from around the country and possibly beyond.

Thing #19

I explored many of the different Web 2.0 award winning websites and was pleased to find several of the sites we have already explored were award winners. Listed under the mapping applications, I liked the community walk program. www.communitywalk.com It allowed me to find locations on the map, draw routes and edit the map for my use. It also allowed me to make my map public, limit access to those I choose or make it a private map. I would use this program to show students how to use maps (ex. locate Woodview Elementary School), how to edit them for their own use and have them compare today's maps with those from the past. The program also allows you to download your map to a web page or blog. Again, because it is a website, students with computers at home can practice using it which bridges the learning at school with the learning at home (unfortunately, not all students have computers at home and therefore they might need additional opportunities to use computers at school).

Thing #18

Open Office seems like an upgrade from Microsoft Office in that is easily compatible with different formats from different years and allows you to do things that are not as easy to do on Microsoft Office (ex. drawing). I like the fact that this program can be used by students at school or at home. The open-source license is a big plus.

Google docs also allows you to transfer many different types of documents. The share documents mode makes accessibility to others easy by having you create a list of users. This also prevents those who you do not want to view your product from doing so. I love that more than one person can make edits at the same time which can be critical when time is limited. Because this and Open Office are online they give users and advantage over Microsoft Office in that you do not have to e-mail a document to yourself to have access to it at home. I did not even think about the fact that online storage prevents loss of documents due to computer crashes. It is very easy to create a webpage link to your documents which is great if you want students to view your/their documents at school or at home.

I think these tools provide much greater capabilities than Microsoft Office. The one disadvantage I can see is that most people are more familiar with Microsoft Office since it has been in use for quite some time. Practice with Open Office and Google docs could offset this lack of experience with the programs.